Contributors

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

They're at it again

This morning, I got the (dis)pleasure of waking up to what NPR calls "news." It's always good to listen to what both ends of the political spectrum are saying; there are things going on that one side won't tell you about, but the other side will.

So that's why I occasionally endure Rush Limbaugh as well as NPR. Most of the news I get is slanted to the Left, because most news outlets swing that way. So I generally don't have to seek out the Left's viewpoint, because we're all deluged with it. Unfortunately, the stuff coming from the Left is getting less and less credible: they just cannot constrain themselves to stick with facts any more. For instance look at the extreme bias in the so-called "global warming" issue: most people aren't even aware that there is a very vigorous ongoing debate in the scientific community over whether it's human-caused. Most people think that the science is "settled," whatever that means, or that there's a "scientific consensus," whatever that is.

A great many of the Right's outlets make me sick (not Limbaugh, at least he's entertaining but I just don't consider him worth my time) but I have to force myself to go to their outlets sometimes to get the parts of the stories that the Left-biased mainstream media won't tell us. Most of the time, the Right doesn't flat-out lie and make stuff up, as the Lefties do, but they're so steeped in their shame-based religious nonsense that they still wouldn't recognize good critical thinking if it walked up and spread its legs right in front of them.

Thank His Noodliness (that's equivalent to "thank god" to you heathens who still haven't received the gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster) for Reason Magazine. They're about the only daily voice of sanity in a world that is "perishing in an orgy of self-sacrifice" [Ayn Rand].

So, what was the item in the News of the People's Republic (NPR) that so upset me? More Wal-Mart bashing. They just can't leave Wal-Mart alone -- or any other business, for that matter, that doesn't pay them their "protection" money. By all that's right and holy, the entire Democratic Party should be indicted under the RICO act* because they've become nothing more than an organized crime ring of thugs that go around the country shaking down successful businesses for "donations" with the threat of destroying them if they don't pay up. Remember the "sweatshop" propaganda campaign against Nike? That happened because some Democrat tried to shake them down, and they refused to pay. Well, now they're doing it to Wal-Mart.

Ever wonder why they don't go after Costco? Ever wonder why Costco never gets any oppostion to putting up THEIR "big-box" stores? Why Costco never gets accused of driving local mom-and-pop operations out of business with prices against which a smaller store cannot compete?

Here's why: the executives at Costco donate heavily to the Democratic Party and to so-called "liberal" causes. And, if memory serves me correctly, Costco is a union shop. The Walton family donates to Republicans and their causes -- and, of course, the unions have been unable to convince Wal-Mart's employees that they're miserable and unhappy and that they should organize. And that's it, pure and simple.

The arguments against Wal-Mart are to the field of economics what Intelligent Design is to the field of biology: junk science. If you need a primer in economics to understand this, surf on over to reason.com and do a search for articles about Wal-Mart.

Remember that this is not about the poor Wal-Mart employees (because they're perfectly happy). It is not about all of the poor mom-and-pops that are being driven out of business (because there aren't any). It is about politics. And politics is about power, and the money that buys power. And that's ALL that it's ever about.

And by the way, I shop at both Wal-Mart and Costco. What their executives do with their own money is their business.

KenWWJD -- What Would John [Galt] Do?

* Unfortunately, if they were all indicted and sent to prison, that would leave Republicans in charge. And without any restraints on THEM.... <shudder>